Blog
From the Editor's Desk (April 2014)

23 April 2014

Tony Addison

With inequality much in the news of late, UNU-WIDER currently has a Call for Papers out for our conference on ‘Inequality - measurement, trends, impacts, and policy’ (the call is open until 15 May). The conference takes place 5-6 September 2014, here in Helsinki. It builds on UNU-WIDER’s long standing reputation in the economics of inequality and poverty. Our recent publications in the area include Andrea Cornia’s book Falling Inequality in Latin America: Policy Changes and Lessons (Oxford University Press for UNU-WIDER) as well as the special issue of the Review of Income and Wealth, on ‘Poverty, Development, and Behavioral Economics’, edited by Markus Jäntti, Ravi Kanbur, and Jukka Pirttilä.

This April issue of Angle leads off with an article by Jukka Pirttilä on what behavioural economics might tell us about development policy. Jukka is a new Finnish colleague at UNU-WIDER, and is on leave from the University of Tampere, where he is a professor of economics.

April’s GUESTAngle welcomes Justin Lin and Yang Wang on opportunities for Africa’s economic growth and diversification in light of global economic developments, and China’s own structural transformation. The latter is making available millions of jobs in the parts of the value chain that China is now moving out of.

This month’s VIDEOAngle is an interview by Carl-Gustav Lindén with our new colleague Wisdom Akpalu, based in Ghana. Wisdom is an expert on natural resources, environmental economics and climate change, especially in the context of Africa. We have more interviews with UNU-WIDER research staff and visitors in forthcoming issues of Angle.

In RESEARCHAngle, we feature two recent WIDER working papers out of ReCom. One is ‘Maximizing the effectiveness of foreign aid in the forestry sector’. The other is ‘An assessment of a village development programme in Mozambique’. These are just two of the many WIDER Working Papers available – 80 new ones so far in 2014. Recent papers range across topics such as: savings and the poor; foreign direct investment in Cambodia; young people and employment in rural Africa; aid and the environment in Tanzania; industry in Ghana; manufacturing in Tunisia; and access to financial services in Mexico. There are many more, and they are all ready for you to download here.

Helsinki is now on the cusp of spring, with buds on the trees – and nearly 16 hours of daylight. Finland celebrates the traditional 'Vappu' holiday on 1 May, which marks the end of the winter. So I expect it will snow. Angle is back in May with more news from UNU-WIDER.

Tony Addison is Chief Economist-Deputy Director, UNU-WIDER.​
 

WIDERAngle newsletter
April 2014
ISSN 1238-9544

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